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Ask HN: What are your favorite instances of software depicted in movies?

2 points by jbranchaud ↗ HN
There are countless examples of software being depicted in movies and television, most of which are completely absurd, inaccurate, and even insulting (to those of us who work with computers and write software regularly). These range from flashing, red alerts informing you that access is denied to intense hacking scenes to monitors in the background of a control room with lots of data scrolling down the terminal interface. What are your favorites (or rather least favorites)? Descriptions are fine, but links to actual video clips are better.

For example, the first part of this video contains some of the classic scenes from the original Jurassic Park movie -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znrc2iGyZ8E

7 comments

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logn
'Hackers' has to be my favorite. It's all pretty absurd but captures the excitement well... from 3-d tunnels for tunneling into systems, walls of text representing databases, cookie monsters and rabbits as memory problems, I love it.
jbranchaud
I must agree this is a classic. The way they try to visualize the inside of the computer and the file system is fantastically ridiculous.
cochese
WarGames, however inaccurate, changed my view on computers when I saw it circa 1994 when I was 9 years old. The device I used to type up papers and find nudity transformed into something I could manipulate and customize without ever leaving the desk it sat upon.
acesubido
The starting scene on The Social Network. The way they depicted how Zuck pieced together the facemash app. It had no special effects, it was an accurate depiction of a hackathon session.
jbranchaud
I cannot think of any other scene besides this that actually gives a reasonably realistic depiction of someone writing code/hacking. This is a good one!
helen842000
There's a lot of this in the film Swordfish. I actually quite like this bit a lot, it makes me smile. Hacking represented by some kind of floating 3D CAD model. Hugh Jackman also types so fast he physically sweats.

There's a whole list of this type of tech in films & screenshots - http://apcmag.com/top-10-worst-movie-tech-moments.htm